Somewhere between the drafting and the enforcement of a rental housing inspection ordinance, Contra Costa crossed the line from government for the people to government against the people — that was the underlying message from an angry gallery of Crockett residents at a town meeting last week.

Speaker after speaker in a packed Crockett Community Center berated county Director of Building Inspection Carlos Baltodano and planner Bob Drake with complaints about the county’s enforcement drive in their unincorporated West County town.

Aimed at bettering the lot of tenants, the law buries landlords in costly red tape, ultimately hurting tenants as well, they complained.

“I’m in danger of being evicted because of your program,” said Martijn Mollet, a Crockett tenant happy with his landlord and his apartment.

After his landlord fixed up the property, the county declared the building that dates to 1889 substandard, Mollet said. That means the landlord may have to “tear down the renovations and restore the building to its dilapidated state,” Mollet said.

Many residents described the ordinance in terms of a well-intentioned, if paternalistic, idea that has morphed into a bureaucratic monster.

The county officials explained that the ordinance is designed not only to preserve the health and safety of tenants but also uphold maintenance standards. They acknowledged the county could have done a better job of selling the program to its diverse communities and that it might have to be tweaked.

“We need to be sensitive,” Baltodano said.

Many Crockett houses pre-date the county’s original zoning ordinance of 1947 and most landlords there have four or fewer units, a show of hands revealed. Several complained that the ordinance was enacted without the town’s input and that a “one-size-fits-all” law, tailored to much different communities where tenants complain of slumlords, makes no sense for Crockett. They complained their town is being singled out.

“We’re not picking on this area,” Baltodano said. “We’re going from area to area.”

Crockett is the third unincorporated community after Bay Point and North Richmond targeted for enforcement since the county Board of Supervisors adopted the ordinance in 2005. Next on the list are Rodeo, Montalvin Manor and El Sobrante, Baltodano said.

County officials have said the program worked well in North Richmond, but a landlord from that community, Rufus Carr, disagreed.

“It’s exactly the same as here,” Carr said. In his community, the county’s enforcement has caused houses where people live to be torn down, Carr said.

Heidi Petty, board president of the Crockett Community Services District, which co-sponsored the event with the Crockett Improvement Association, compiled a list of the most common concerns. They include the difficulty of proving apartments are legal and that the burden of proof falls on owners, not the county.

Earlier, Drake had said owners must supply “credible evidence from independent sources, not opinions.” Several owners said they had to track down historical information in the Crockett Historical Museum that officials still sometimes balked at accepting.

Other complaints included short timelines to fix problems; onerous fees and costs; long waiting times in multiple lines; multiple inspections; and a prevalence of faulty zoning information at the county.

Several people questioned the logic of Crockett’s zoning, which makes 5,000-square-foot lots, a common size here, substandard.

“These lots were there before you wrote the law,” resident John Spinola said.

Landlord Andres Barahona said the county chose a bad time to pick on owners.

“The highest rate of foreclosures is on rentals,” he said.

Pedrotti said the county should enforce zoning and permit issues only when a property is sold. Resident Deanne Broglio suggested allowing landlords to “self-guarantee” that their properties comply with certain codes, the same way contractors can sign off on some work.

Several people said inspections should occur when someone complains, not as a matter of routine.

But other landlords spoke favorably of the county and its ordinance.

“The idea is good,” said Tom McAllister, who owns two duplexes in Crockett. “Tenant safety is not a bad thing.”

Another, who identified himself only as Francis, said, “I was treated fairly, helpfully and efficiently” by the county.